Note 24 — FOLK-TALES AND SONGS

When the man came a little later Lichao made his slave-girl put on beautiful ornaments and fine clothes, but his real daughter he made to sit all in rags and dirty in the outside room. But the man was not to be deceived. He loved Lichao’s daughter and would only take her.24 Now Lichao used to turn into a tiger and eat human flesh. Therefore he set his son-in-law hard tasks, meaning to devour him if he did not fulfil them. But when she knew this the maiden said to him, “Whatever task my father gives you to perform, tell me and I will reveal to you his purpose.” So one day Lichao said to the man, “Go and pick the leaves of kotyoh thorns and koremyoi thorns, and bring them without a single leaf being torn and without a single scratch on your body. If you do this I will let you depart with my daughter.” Then the girl said to her husband,25 “If you come home with the slightest scratch on your body, or with a single leaf torn, my father will devour you.” So her husband went and picked the leaves without a single one being torn and without scratching his body in the least, and rolled them into a very tight bundle and brought and gave them to Lichao. Then Lichao said, “Only that amount will not be enough for us,” but when he opened the bundle to look, the leaves covered all the ground in front of his house.